Tolerance?

Introduction

In 1986, the world watched in horror as the space shuttle Challenger exploded just 73 seconds after liftoff, killing all seven astronauts aboard. The cause? A small, overlooked part called an O-ring had failed due to cold temperatures.

But here’s what history reveals: engineers had warned about the dangers of the O-ring design for years. Reports were made. Concerns were raised. But the warnings were downplayed or ignored. Why? Because launches were going well, success looked good on the outside, and the pressure to keep things moving was high.

In the end, a preventable flaw — tolerated in the system — led to tragedy.

Thyatira is on the precipice of the same tragedy. They neglected to confront sin among them, and they are on the brink of death.

Read Revelation 2:18-29

Revelation 2:18–29 ESV

“And to the angel of the church in Thyatira write: ‘The words of the Son of God, who has eyes like a flame of fire, and whose feet are like burnished bronze. “ ‘I know your works, your love and faith and service and patient endurance, and that your latter works exceed the first. But I have this against you, that you tolerate that woman Jezebel, who calls herself a prophetess and is teaching and seducing my servants to practice sexual immorality and to eat food sacrificed to idols. I gave her time to repent, but she refuses to repent of her sexual immorality. Behold, I will throw her onto a sickbed, and those who commit adultery with her I will throw into great tribulation, unless they repent of her works, and I will strike her children dead. And all the churches will know that I am he who searches mind and heart, and I will give to each of you according to your works. But to the rest of you in Thyatira, who do not hold this teaching, who have not learned what some call the deep things of Satan, to you I say, I do not lay on you any other burden. Only hold fast what you have until I come. The one who conquers and who keeps my works until the end, to him I will give authority over the nations, and he will rule them with a rod of iron, as when earthen pots are broken in pieces, even as I myself have received authority from my Father. And I will give him the morning star. He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.’

Explanation

Some preliminary thoughts.

Jesus appearance - eyes of flame and feet of burnished bronze.

Eyes of flame refer to the penetrating gaze of Jesus. He sees everything that exists. He sees the actions of man, but he also sees the thoughts and emotions of man. He is not deceived.

Feet of Burnished Bronze - Thyatira’s trade (bronze) and Jesus’ capacity for war. He is unrivaled in strength.

Jesus’ Commendation

The church in Thyatira is loving, faithful, patiently enduring hardship, and their work is increasing. This could mean that more people were coming to faith, and the church was growing.

They were loving to the people they were around. They were consistent in faithfulness even during the hard times.

Jesus’ Rebuke

Jesus does not expect perfection, for only He is perfect. But, he does expect for us to be a community of repentant sinners. We fall, we turn to him, he picks us up, we keep going. This is the story of our lives. And he also expects us to call sin what He calls sin.

Jesus calling someone Jezebel in the church. What in the world could this have meant?

The scholarly consensus is that this woman wasn’t named Jezebel, and in fact, it is probably a group of people teaching this way. Jesus is really focused on WHAT they are teaching more than anything. And the name Jezebel gives us a picture of what He sees.

Jezebel was a queen in Israel, a Sidonian, around the time of Elijah and Elisha. Her husband, Ahab, was a wicked king, but his wickedness PALED in comparison to his wife’s. In his lack of leadership, Jezebel filled the vacuum, and her actions were terrible. She plotted to kill and did kill people for their land. She tried to kill Elijah. She was violent. Yet, there was a sin that was more blatantly destructive to EVERYONE.

She encouraged the worship of Ba’al, Ashtorahs, and other gods at an unprecedented rate. The story of Elijah vs. the 400 prophets of Ba’al - those were Jezebel’s prophets.

It wasn’t that Jezebel was restrictive… it was that she was permissive. She was perfectly fine with you worshipping as many of the gods as you wanted and living in sexual sin if that’s what you wanted to do.

She encouraged Israel to worship both the Ba’als and Yahweh. In doing this, she led the people towards licentious living. So, her name is a motif for compromise.

There was duality in the practice of their lives. They were not pilgrims in their culture but participators.

Jesus pronounces a judgement, not over the whole church, but over Jezebel and her followers. We so often talk about the letters in red. And one of the defenses I here against Biblical morality is “the letters in red don’t say that.” The same man who relayed to us the words of Jesus in John 3:16 also relayed to us these words of Jesus in Revelation 2. Same speaker - Jesus. Same writer - John, the disciple of Jesus. If you bristle at this text then you bristle at the words of Jesus.

Jesus’ rebuke is fair. This Jezebel had been given time to repent.

Jesus rebuke is full and final. Jesus is going to eventually bring an end to these actions. Jesus is preserving the church that is continuing his ministry, AND He is showing that He is serious about his glory.

God’s discipline is fearful. In the judgement that Jesus has for these people, Jesus says, “all the churches will know that I am he who searches mind and heart, and I will give to each according to your works.” These churches will begin to take me seriously.

APPLICATION:

You cannot live both for Jesus and in sin. They are incompatible.

Some of you know Jesus and you are living in sin. And you are miserable. Absolutely miserable.

Three types of people:

You know Jesus, and you are walking with him. You are blessed and joyful.

You don’t know Jesus, and you think you are happy. But something nags at you… isn’t there something more to life.

You know Jesus, and you are not walking with Him. And you are miserable.

What is Biblical tolerance? Revelation 2:20 “But I have this against you, that you tolerate that woman Jezebel,”

In the public square, tolerance allows people with different religious beliefs to live together in peace and respect each other as humans. That is a good thing, and it is a Christian idea. Freedom of religion is a good thing.

In the church, tolerance means that we go to all people. We do not discriminate. We love all people. We cherish all people. We work for the good of all people. We are good neighbors to all people. It doesn’t matter their background, religion, sin, lifestyle, etc. We love and do good for them.

However, we are also called to love. And love for the Christian does not equate to tolerance. They are not the same thing. For the Christian, we believe that Jesus sets you free. He sets you free from the chains of you and gives you the freedom to live as Christ does. And love for us is the willingness to share of both faith AND repentance.

We have misdefined tolerance with love, and we have substituted affirmation for grace.

Confusing tolerance with love.

Imagine Kevin, Jonathan, and I are sitting around a fireplace while we are camping. And Jonathan is making dinner. He has a stew in a pot over the fire. Kevin walks up to the fire, and drops some herbs in the fire. He found them on his hike, and he thinks it would be good in the stew. The only problem is - I know the herb Kevin through into the pot is poisonous.

I have three options - not two.

I can eat the stew and pretend nothing is wrong until I get really sick.

I can choose not to eat the stew and not tell them. After all, what they do is their business.

OR, I can tell everyone that the stew is now poisonous. And I will risk Jonathan being mad, because now his stew is ruined. And I will risk Kevin being embarrassed, because after all, he only wanted to help.

What is the only ethical decision? To warn my friends that the soup is poisonous.

The “old” tolerance is the willingness to put up with, allow, and endure people and ideas with whose we disagree; in its purest form, the new tolerance is the social commitment to treat all ideas and people as equally right, save for those people who disagree with this view of tolerance. // D. A. Carson

Substituting affirmation for grace.

Affirmation says, “You are good as you are.” Grace says, “You can come as you are.”

The God of the universe is making us into something better.

The affirmation of whoever someone wants to be is the belief that they are all satisfying to themselves. That is a lie. We cannot satisfy ourselves.

C. S. Lewis once said, “Nearly all of human history - money, poverty, ambition, war, prostitution, classes, empire, and slavery - is a long, terrible history of man trying to find something other than God to make Him happy.

One day, you will stand before the God of the universe and the deafening sound of millions upon millions of angels will ring out before the throne, “Holy, Holy, Holy, is the Lord God Almighty, who was and is and is to come.” And in that moment, you will realize, more than ever before, that you want to be as much like him as you possibly can.

Grace is God’s giving us what we do not deserve. By grace, we are able to live a life of holiness. We can emulate the God of the universe.

Galatians 5:1“For freedom Christ has set us free; stand firm therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery.”

In Christ, you now have freedom. The freedom to change. The freedom to be holy and blameless. The freedome to be pure. The freedom to walk in the presence of God.

But we often confuse the freedom to life the beautiful life God has for us with the freedom to do what we want. They are not the same thing.

Let me give you an outlandish example.

Let’s say you are playing a pickup game of basketball. And during that game someone walks up to you and says, “I want to play.”

And you are pumped because you need some more players. But there is only one problem. This guy is in handcuffs, and his hands are behind his back. And you say, sure man, let me get you out of those handcuffs and you can play with us.

But he says, “How dare you?” These are my handcuffs, and I am going to play basketball with them. And you begin to play with him, but he can’t pass or dribble or shoot or rebound or anything else.

What has happened? His belief that he can play basketball however he wants to has cancelled his ability to play how it was designed to be played. So, therefore, he isn’t really playing basketball.

Freedom isn’t in choosing how to play. Freedom is the ability to play the way the game was designed to be played.

Recently, we have defined choosing the handcuffs as freedom in the Christian life. But the real freedom the ability to walk in holiness. What a better freedom.

So many around us are handcuffed spiritually. How dare we neglect to share with them that even though they can choose the handcuffs, there is a better life in Jesus? Freedom from the handcuffs. To be through with sin and attain holiness.

Invitation

May we know the grace of Jesus - the grace that sets us free.

And let us be heralds of that grace to others.